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"Editing the Ship Histories".

The Ships

Ship Name

Type and class, main
characteristics, WW1 Battle Honours, Fate including links
to any Battle Honours, World War 1 fates, and World War 2 service.

Also images of various aspects of naval
life at sea and ashore

Logbook periods covered and main locations including links
to any contemporary accounts

Images, click for enlargements. Most images are taken, with
permission, from Internet sites (for which our thanks)..

Most of the photographs of hired
vessels e.g. armed merchant cruisers, commissioned escort ships, are as they appeared in civilian service.
Hence SS for Steamship. In some cases it is uncertain
if the photograph is of an earlier or later ship with the same name - in this
case a qualification is added.

main gun armament, either diameter of barrel in inches (in) or
weight of shell in pounds (pdr), plus torpedo tubes (tt) for destroyers and
aircraft for seaplane/aircraft carriers

speed in knots (kts) or nautical miles per hour

crew - total number of officers and ratings

Royal Navy battle honours or single-ship actions awarded in World
War 1

Fate, including lost, service in World War 2, sold for breaking up

2.
Additional abbreviations:

CPO - Chief Petty Officer

RAN - Royal Australian Navy

RIM - Royal Indian Marine (or navy)

SS - steamship

U. - German U-boat or submarine

UB. - German coastal submarine

UC. - German coastal minelaying submarine

3. Ship Information

Few of the characteristics are precise and often vary from source to source. This is partly due
to how some are measured, but mainly to changes during operation or the career of the vessel. For example:

Warship displacement tonnage can
be as varied as load, deep load, average load, legend, normal, and that is
before you get into the complexity of gross and other tonnage used to measure
merchant vessels.

Launch dates are usually precise,
but completion can vary depending on how it is defined. Merchant ships are
usually associated with a build year.

Apart from main armament (number
of barrels x internal diameter of gun barrel or weight of shell), World War 1
ships often mounted a variety of secondary armament and as the war progressed,
more anti-aircraft guns. These could change, often frequently, and few
records were kept. As a main role of destroyers was torpedo attack, and for
aircraft and seaplane carriers, the number of aircraft that could be flown
off from sea or flight-deck, the numbers of these two weapons are included.

Speed in knots is usually the
maximum. Ships rarely steamed at high speed because of the disproportionate
use of coal or oil fuel. Also speed often dropped over time as vessels and
engines aged. Economic cruising speed would be preferred.

Crews are usually quoted, if more
than one figure is given, as peacetime, wartime, and as a flagship that
additionally carried an Admiral and staff, at least for big ships. These
numbers only ever appear to be approximate, with actual crew sizes
fluctuating.

Even fates are rarely precise. The
cause of a ship sinking are usually known, but sometimes only by post-war
research, but times and positions can vary wildly - if your ship is sinking
in heavy seas, recording such niceties no doubt gets overlooked. Of course,
if a ship disappears without trace, that is another matter. Even sold and
broken up dates vary.